


Conversations with the Dead

by lunabee34 (Lorraine)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Book 6: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Canon Compliant, Gen, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-22
Updated: 2014-03-22
Packaged: 2018-01-16 16:02:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 660
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1353394
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lorraine/pseuds/lunabee34
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is a short ficlet set during the time in which Draco is working on the cabinet in the Room of Requirement.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Conversations with the Dead

1.

Draco thinks, _I don’t like Weasley. Or Granger. And definitely not Potter. I hate them, actually. But why can’t the Dark Lord just quarantine their sort in St. Mungo’s instead of expecting us to make garlands of their entrails?_ He washes his face in the sink, notices how sharp and pinched his features have become. His eyes are ringed with shadows and inexplicably he feels a sort of hysterical giggle bubbling up. Draco’s surprised when what he’s holding back turns out to be a sob. “I don’t want to do this,” he whispers.

“What’s that?” A girl’s voice echoes suddenly and loudly in the bathroom. “What don’t you want to do?”

Draco whirls around, billowing his robes in a cultivated imitation of Professor Snape. “Who’s there?”

“It’s only me, silly boy. Moaning Myrtle, of course.” And she floats down from the ceiling, listing from side to side like a bit of foam on a wave. 

Draco digs his fists into his eyes, shoulders his bag of tools and walks right through Myrtle’s monochrome form. From the hall he hears her ask, “Are you as rude to the living?”

 

2\. 

“Why are you crying, little boy?” Myrtle plunges into the overlarge sink basin and props her hands on her chin.

Draco cannot answer her, not yet. He’s sitting on the cold tile, pressing the heel of his hand into his mouth so he does not cry aloud. He cannot say, _Because my father made a mistake years ago and now I’m paying the price. Because the first thing of any consequence that I ever remember him saying to me is, ‘I made this bed and now you must lie in it.’ Because I don’t want to die._

Myrtle blinks at him. She’s a washed out watery gray, the light reflected in her glasses like the shine of winter sun on the lake. “Why won’t you ever say what’s the matter?” Myrtle springs up and swan dives into Draco’s lap. He doesn’t even flinch anymore as her cold emptiness surrounds him—-that somehow tangible nothing that feels not so much of cold as the ache underneath the freeze.

He wipes his face with his robes and leans back against the wall. Myrtle’s nose is almost touching his own and he can see himself through her haze in the mirror, his own blurred face with Myrtle’s superimposed. Draco Malfoy in pigtails.

He smiles and Myrtle claps her hands and rockets into one of the toilets with a plop.

 

3\. 

“What’s it like to be dead, Myrtle?” Draco asks.

She hiccups and giggles, backstroking her way across the ceiling. “Lonely.” Myrtle pauses thoughtfully. “And for me, wet.”

Draco is not stupid. He knows exactly what being a Death Eater entails. As he once overheard Weasley saying, it’s got bloody death in the title. Draco’s seen his Aunt Bella’s mugshot, black hair curtaining half her face, her one visible eye twitching periodically, mouth forever opening and closing in a silent howl. He knows Longbottom’s parents are too broken to even know him anymore and Potter’s parents are actually dead, which Draco isn’t so sure is really worse, and Moaning Myrtle is dead too. All because of the Dark Lord. And soon, maybe, Dumbledore will be dead. Because of Draco.

He hears a tiny noise, the scrape of a shoe, and Potter’s in the doorway, watching him. Draco is first angry, but then an overwhelming relief settles on him like the snug embrace of still water. 

“Crucio!” Draco says, and deliberately hesitates, just long enough for Potter to take advantage. Then Draco’s falling, slowly and forever falling, Myrtle’s face suspended above his, and he can see himself in her glasses, his blood reflected black and glistening. In those few precious moments before Professor Snape heals him, when Draco knows that he is dying, that soon he will be dead, Myrtle takes his hand and her fingers are warm and damp and her grip is tight.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Conversations With Yourself (The "Conversations the Dead" Remix)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1569275) by [kelly_chambliss](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kelly_chambliss/pseuds/kelly_chambliss)




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